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Saturday, July 09, 2011

Great News: Friday's Anemic Jobs Number Are Likely Bogus

You think the abysmal jobs report Friday was bad? Just wait until the inevitable revision of the meager figure of 18,000 jobs saved (or created, as Team Obama is fond of saying).

The Labor Department officially announced that only 18,000 jobs were created during the month of June compared to May's levels. That's considerably below the 157,000 jobs that payroll-processing firm ADP said on Thursday were added by companies in the private sector.

Our economy is said to need at least 150,000 jobs a month just to keep up with people entering the workforce. So even job growth of 150,000 isn't good enough.

Worse, not only are newcomers trying to find positions, but there are also 7.084 million fewer jobs in this economy than there were at the 2008 peak. So people who'd like to get their careers started are competing against millions of experienced job seekers looking to just get back into the game.

Now for the really bad news: that 18,000 gain announced by the government yesterday isn't real.

For one thing, the number of jobs increased in June only because the Labor Department simultaneously revised downward the number of jobs that existed in this country during May. It's like moving the fences at Citi Field so the Mets players can hit more home runs. It might make Jose Reyes feel better, but it doesn't actually make him more powerful.

Without the fence-moving operation in the May employment report, the June number -- yesterday's number -- would have shown a decline of 26,000 jobs.

Then there's another problem with June's employment report. Included in the 18,000 headline number is a guesstimate that 131,000 jobs were created by newly formed -- and, therefore, invisible -- companies.

If you want to send your resume to one of these companies, don't bother. They probably don't exist, and neither do the jobs the government thinks they are creating. These figments of the imagination of the Labor Department's computers will probably disappear when the numbers are checked early next year.

Look even deeper in the June report and you'll see something else you really don't want to know. The more broadly defined U-6 unemployment rate, which includes people who are underemployed, went from 15.8 percent in May to 16.2 percent in June.

These are workers who want full-time jobs but can't find them. And the U-6 figure doesn't even include people who've given up looking for work because they believe it's hopeless.

Since this entire column is filled with bad news, I may as well give it all to you at once: The job numbers are only going to get worse in the months ahead.

Responding to the Friday jobs report, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney doubled down on Plouffe's analysis: "Most people do not sit around the kitchen table and analyze GDP and unemployment numbers. They talk about how they feel, their own economic situation . . . whether they're making their house payments."

With the rate of foreclosures continuing to climb on Obama's watch, maybe "house payments" isn't the best metric.

But his naive logic shouldn't surprise.

It's been clear from Day One that this White House is clueless when it comes to the economy.

Next thing you know, the Ministry of Information will release a statement saying the economy is enjoying an unpresedented boom. And if anyone disagrees, they will be investigated. After all, it is up to the "comrades" to hope for change: can we do it? yes we can!

Whatever happened to the old Clinton mantra of "It's the economy, stupid...?" Plouffe is ramping up his Marxist class-warfare Mighty Wurlitzer to full volume now, and the pilot fish around Obama's Great Cafe-au-lait Shark are in a frenzy.

The Demonrats are so crazy stupid panic-attack mindless that I'm kicking back and roasting the popcorn. This is gonna be a suicide saga of vast proportions.

I just want to revisit what Carney and Plouffe said because it is so deeply disturbing. Can we say PROJECTION?!? They have reached the conclusion that Americans don't care about their fellow Americans being out of work. That all they care about is if THEY have a job and how THEY are doing. Does this sound like you or me or other ordinary Americans? How in God's name could they ever come to that conclusion?

They came to that bizarre conclusion for one simple reason. That's how THEY feel, and since they consider themselves ordinary, they feel by intuition that the rest of America probably feels the same. Other people's unemployment doesn't bother them because, hell, they've got GREAT jobs, and so do all their friends. They are simply projecting their own cynical callousness onto the rest of the country, and that is going to be our national policy until this administration is gone. Translation: We're tired of hearing about it. We don't care, and we don't think you care either.

The only good thing about the job numbers is that those existing college are being hit the worse. Why is that good? Because we have them to thank for the jerk in the office now. I hope they learned something, but really doubt it.